The XX Factor: What women really think.

Send in the Evangelicals

Another post from Hanna Rosin, who is having technical difficulties:

Think of it this way: This is not a gesture that signifies acceptance or even necessarily a desire for reconciliation. Instead it has a faint air of condescension, even tokenism. It puts evangelicals in the position of feeling grateful to be included.

I agree with you, Dahlia. Warren will never budge on gay marriage or abortion. But the tide is turning against people like Warren. The younger generation of Christians gives gay marriage a big shrug.

Leave them out of the next four or eight years, and they'll do what they always do: rise again. Give them a place—a symbolic one, as E.J. points out—and the whole thing will go more smoothly.
 

Read the rest of the XX Factor's discussion about Rick Warren giving the inaugural invitation.

Let Warren Speak!

A post from Hanna Rosin, en route to parts tropical:

I have to take a break from my vacation to object to this liberal groupthink. We elected Obama partly because he is able to talk to people with different views. Our standards for hearing out a religious leader should not be: Does he believe everything we believe? It should be: Is he willing to talk to the other side? Many months ago, Rick Warren gave the stage over to Obama—showing a form of open-mindedness from an evangelical leader we haven't seen since Billy Graham. Now it's Obama's turn to reciprocate. Your strategy—E.J. and others—would involve pretending evangelicals don't exist. And what good would that do?